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<title>There's too much confusion by Salomonderiel</title>
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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25974382">There's too much confusion</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salomonderiel/pseuds/Salomonderiel'>Salomonderiel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Humor, M/M, Post-Canon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 10:34:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>617</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25974382</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Salomonderiel/pseuds/Salomonderiel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Nile asks a question about religion and gets two very different answers. </p><p>Look at that leather jacket. Those trousers with far too many zips to be practical. That rebel-loving, badass motherfucking artist sings Rolling Stones when he’s cooking and you can pry that headcanon from my cold dead hands.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>11</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>272</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>There's too much confusion</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>It's been so long since I posted anything on here I've almost forgotten HOW. </p><p>I have Thoughts about Joe and Nicky in the summer of love. Fic title from the song. </p><p>NB: this is no dig at one of them being more religious than the other, I fully believe both of them have only had their faith grow stronger over the years. Just... context is important when joining new conversations.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“You said you were a priest. Do you still believe?”</p><p>There were somewhere in Normandy, France. A town small enough to get some privacy, but that saw enough tourist traffic that none of the locals looked twice at visitors.</p><p>Nile had found Nicky reading in their small garden. They had a decent view of the sea from here, even if you had to peer over the rooves of countless houses to find it. At her words, Nicky looked up, confused. “What? In God? Of course.”</p><p>“But <em>how</em>?” Nile asked, collapsing onto the grass next to him. “My expectations of pearly white gates have been kind of…” she shrugged, not wanting to say ‘shattered’, but thinking it.</p><p>Luckily, Nicky seemed to understand. He closed his book, and smiled at her. “Ah, you got Andy’s ‘God is dead’ speech, then?”</p><p>Nile let her head fall into her folded arms. She must look like a petulant child, but she didn’t care. “Yeah,” she muttered, voice muffled.</p><p>Nicky laughed softly at her. “Well, I can’t tell you anything with certainty,” he said, which was <em>not</em> what Nile had come to him to hear. “After all, if there was no cause for doubt, there’d be no strength in faith. But I can tell you that all the times I’ve felt nearest to God have happened since my first death.”</p><p>Hesitantly – curious, mostly – Nile raised her head. “Really?”</p><p>Nicolo nodded. “Absolutely. The Cattedrale di San Lorenzo, in Genoa, wasn’t finished until the late fourteenth century. But entering that building for the first time, a place that holy, so close to where I had first found God – it was the strongest feeling of coming home that I have ever experienced. And when I reached the top of Mont Blanc in the Alps, just in time for the sunrise – there’s no view like it, nothing. You can feel his love in everything you see.”</p><p>He was looking out towards the horizon at something Nile couldn’t see, but she followed his gaze anyway. “That doesn’t sound so bad,” she said, with a smile.</p><p>“Of course, some of the things that caused me to feel wonder are a bit more commonplace nowadays,” Nicky said, waving a hand almost apologetically. “For instance, Joe and I once challenged ourselves to take a boat to the Americas, just us, in this small thing. The first time you wake up to realise there is <em>nothing</em> around you, no other people, no land, just you in this great expanse… though I guess that’s almost normal, with travel these days. And besides, I’m sure Joe would tell you that was more aw<em>ful</em>, than awe-inspiring.”</p><p>“You talking about me?”</p><p>Speak of the devil. Joe had found them, standing in the doorway with a mug in one hand and his sketchbook in the other.</p><p>“Talking about religious experiences,” Nicky corrected, in a way that didn’t imply that the two were incompatible.</p><p>Joe sighed, smiling. “Oh, you want to hear about religious experiences?” he asked Nile, making his way over. He sank down to the grass with ease. “Atlanta Music Festival, 1970. First time I heard Jimi Hedrix’s cover of <em>The Watchtower</em>. Yeah, Bob Dylan might be the wordsmith, but you hand that song over to Hendrix and that man is purely heavenly <em>magic</em> with a guitar, and when he started on that solo<em> -</em> and the <em>atmosphere</em> in that place, <em>that</em> was something else entirely, at least half the audience was on drugs -”</p><p>Wide-eyed, grinning, Nile looked across at Nicky. The poor, long-suffering Italian had his head in his hands.</p><p>Joe cut off. He cleared his throat. “Well,” he said, “I guess. The first time I experienced Fajr prayer at Mecca was also kinda good.”</p>
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